Week 3-5

Week 3:
Week 3 was our week at Kerber Creek. There is a whole big explanation that I don’t remember about why and how Kerber Creek got messed up. I think the main problem is the town of Bonanza (which I am unable to say without ridiculous emphasis on the NAN part of the word). BoNANza is much smaller than Saguache but used to be quite the bustling mining town. I don’t remember what that really has to do with the creek, but I’m pretty sure it was involved. Anyway, the creek doesn’t flow very well in lots of parts. This is bad because it runs into the Rio Grande which apparently hasn’t actually reached the Gulf of Mexico for like eight of the past ten years or something. The BLM is trying to get Kerber Creek to run better so it will help the Rio Grande. The mine did something like deposit a bunch of chemicals or something which both killed a lot of the vegetation around the creek and also widened the creek in parts. Steve said that the creek flows best when it is a narrow deep channel. Widening it makes it flow slower. I don’t quite remember how this helped narrow the creek channel, but our main job was to install wattles. What are wattles, you ask? They are 20 foot long mesh tubes filled with hay. They come on pallets rolled up so they look like cinnamon rolls. To install them, you unroll them and put them in kind of a U shape along the creek, with the ends pointing away from the creek. It is fairly hilly in most places along the creek, so the wattles catch whatever dirt and stuff might be falling down the hill and into the creek and promotes new growth. When you have in where you want it, you hammer in a few wood stakes to hold it to the ground. Yes, there were several vampire slayer jokes with the stakes. The work isn’t hard, but carrying the wattles to where they needed to go was pretty unpleasant. They’re heavier than they seem like they should be. It was also really windy that day and straw was flying everywhere. Everyone had straw in every pocket of their clothes as well as sometimes in their hair and mouth. Gross. We had to do this in several places along the creek, and as usual, we finished before they expected us to. The last day of the week, since we had finished everything else, we had a pretty silly assignment. We were sent to some private property to fix the wattles the forest service had installed there about a year ago. A lot of people who own land along the creek are cooperating with the BLM’s mission to fix the creek, but only if they don’t have to do any work for it. We went along the creek, which sent us into a huge cow pasture. Let me tell you, it’s pretty unnerving to have a couple hundred cows staring at you, many of whom are also mooing angrily while standing in front of their babies. It was also silly because it was pretty much a job for one person, but there were 11 of us (including Kim, a BLM employee who is writing her thesis on…something relating to the creek). We were split into two groups, one on each side of the creek, but it was still usually just one person doing the little work we had to do and the rest just walking along behind them.

Week 4 and 5:
Week 4 began our two weeks of trail work and brought us yet more confusion. The BLM had said from the beginning, even since they first applied to get an AmeriCorps team, that the weeks we were working on trails we would be camping because the worksite was so far from the church where we live. We planned our meals for the week thinking we would be camping. We packed up on Monday morning to camp. We got to the BLM office in the morning like always and set about finding a camping stove to borrow, and a table, and an extra water jug, and all sorts of things. We were also told that Christina would have to drive back into town every day to get more water for us because there wasn’t a water supply where we would be camping. Then, as Jess and I were going with Steve to find more equipment, he said something about how we could drive back into town to take a shower every day if we wanted to. We said we probably wouldn’t because it was so far, and he informed us that it was only about 20 minutes away. We told everyone else and we all decided that it was way too much trouble to camp when we were so close to town. Ridiculous.

Anyway, these two weeks we were either working on trails with Jake and Jimmy or working on fixing up a campsite with Dario and the Southwest Conservation Corps. We alternated and were split into different groups most of the past two weeks. The first day we did trail work was not much fun for me. Jake and Jimmy were really fun to work with. Jake is 19 and Jimmy is 21, so it was nice to be with other people our age. They’re both pretty funny. The bad part was that the plan for the day was pretty much just to hike this eight-mile trail, each carrying a different tool, and fix anything that needs fixing along the way. We stayed together as a group the whole time. Most of the things that needed fixing were just things like a tree fallen across the trail, or some big loose rocks in the trail, or some plants that are growing into the trail too much. None of these things take 12 people to fix. What ended up happening is that the 3-5 people in the front of the group who would see the problem first would fix it, and the people in the back of the group would stand there. As usual, just like in Big Bend, I was toward the back of the group. I got a lot better (and by better, I mean faster) at hiking by the end of Big Bend, but I’m still a pretty slow hiker compared to a lot of people. Especially going uphill at an altitude of probably like 9,000 feet. I spent most of the day being like fourth from the back. Literally, the only actual work I did that day was this: There was a little section where Becky and Tomm used McClouds to chop out some grass in the trail and I used my flat shovel to smooth the dirt out again. Also, later, there was a random hole in the trail that needed to be filled because horses go on that trail a lot. Other people filled it with dirt, and I used a tamping bar to pack the dirt in. That’s it. That’s all the work I did all day besides just hiking up hills. That is not really my idea of a good day of work.

The day after that, Jake and Jimmy had to be in some kind of training all day, so we were sent to the Buffalo Creek campsite to work with the Southwest Conservation Corps. Most of us were kind of excited to be meeting more people our age. We’ve been really wanting to hang out with other people lately. We hadn’t seen people much since Memorial Day. The BLM people we had hung out with before were mostly the fire management guys, and they have been away a lot on fires and working a lot of weekends. We had been determined to make them our friends, but that’s difficult when they not around and we can’t see them. Anyway, we looked forward to the chance to meet more people. The SCC group was pretty cool once we got to know them a bit better. They had four guys and four girls. I think I ended up working with them more than anyone else did (most of the rest of the team really liked the trail work, but I’m kind of burnt out on it, so I think each time there was a campsite group I was on it) and started really liking most of them. Their program is only like a month long and they came about halfway through our stay here, so I think we’ll be leaving at about the same time.

On Monday of Week 5, Rob and I were the only ones from our team to be working at the campsite. After meeting at the BLM office at 7 like always, we were told we could go ahead and leave because Dario and Aaron, the BLM people in charge of the project, were already there. We arrived at the campsite at about 8 only to find the gate locked. We called Christina and asked her to radio someone and she told us that Heather (not our Heather, a Heather who works for the BLM) had just left the office and would be there in about half an hour. So we waited. While we were waiting, someone drove up. We found out that his name was Calvin and that he was there to take away old picnic tables, but he didn’t have a key for the gate. So we all waited. Luckily I had brought my book along and read for a bit while Rob took a nap, then I decided to take a nap also. Finally, at about 9:30, Dario and Aaron showed up. So we got to start the day with a nice long nap in the truck. When we got in and joined the SCC group, they asked us if we were having fajitas with them. We asked what they were talking about, and they said that Dario had said he would make fajitas for them for lunch that day. We said we would love to have some if there was enough, but if not we had brought our lunches like usual. (Brief tangent: Sometime in the past couple weeks, Steve invited us to his house for breakfast. It turned out to be a cookout breakfast for a bunch of people in the BLM, including us. Steve had a campfire set up outside of his house with a thing the BLM loves to use that is like a wok with legs attached to stand it over a fire. So we got to Steve’s house and Dario was at the fire with a wok full of potatoes and onions. Then Steve and other BLM employees brought out scrambled eggs, tortillas, cheese, and everything else needed to make breakfast burritos. Oh my goodness, it was delicious. End tangent.) So when lunchtime rolled around that day, it turned out that the county commissioners or someone important like that was in the area to look at noxious weeds or something, so the BLM had a huge cookout lunch for them, lots of BLM people, and the SCC. They graciously let us have some. There was one camping wok full of potatoes and onions, another full of chicken with red, green, orange, and yellow peppers, and a third wok for warming up tortillas, some of which were homemade. I had one regular sized one and one small one. It was SO GOOD. The only bad part of the day was the hail we got after lunch, but it didn’t last long.

Also, on Thursday of Week 5, we had some horsemanship training with Gerard. This coming week (the week of 6/21 through 6/24), they’re going to let us ride horses a little, but we needed to have training before they would let us. Horses have always kind of freaked me out. They’re so big, and so powerful, and fairly unpredictable. Even just going near them without a fence between us makes me kind of nervous. During the training, everyone had to take a turn doing several different things. We had to go into the corral and “catch” a horse (put a halter with a lead rope on them), lead it out of the corral, then back in. We had to brush a horse and pick up one of its feet to clean out the hooves. We had to attempt to put a saddle on a horse. Goodness, that was hard. I was the only one who couldn’t do it. Saddles are freaking heavy and really awkward, and horses are tall. Gerard showed us his way where you can use the saddle’s weight as momentum and kind of spin as you fling it upward, kind of like a shot put. When he did it (and he’s a few inches shorter than I am), it just floated right up there. I tried three times. The third time I came close, but I pretty much just flung the saddle at the side of the horse each time. After that, we had to take a horse into a round pen and make the horse run in a circle in both directions. Then we had to do the “pivot exercise.” You hold the halter rope right under the horse’s chin with one hand and put the other hand on their neck. You push the rope and pull the neck to make the horse turn in a circle, being careful not to let it step on your feet. I didn’t do so well at either of the round pen things, but oh well. We can’t all be good at everything. At least by the end of the day I felt much more comfortable being near horses.

Earlier that day, we were sent to go pick up some old fence posts from near Great Sand Dunes National Park. We were told that we could go pick them up, then just hang out in the park for like an hour before bringing the posts back to the BLM office. What actually happened is that we drove around the dirt roads by the park for about two and a half hours, trying to find the posts. We had a map, but apparently some roads on the map didn’t actually exist. Half the team was in our cargo truck and the other half (including me) was in a BLM truck. We couldn’t take our van because we would be driving through sand and they didn’t think Gertrude could make it. In the process of one of the many U-turns we had to make, Alex, who was driving the cargo truck, got it stuck in the sand. (Tangent: Have I mentioned Alex yet? Due to some bureaucratic silliness, Marquis from my regular team and Alex, who was on Sun 5, switched teams. So with the addition of Alex, and without Marquis and Lindsey who’s foot is still broken, our team is rather different. I miss Lindsey and Marquis, but the addition of Alex hasn’t been bad.) We had to tie the cargo to the BLM truck to kind of tow it out after several unsuccessful attempts at pushing it out. So silly. We finally found the posts after so long of driving around then it only took about 20 minutes to load the posts. So silly.

I would now like to write about possibly the worst movie I have ever seen. When we make the great hour-long pilgrimage to Wal-Mart, Tomm likes to get movies. A few times, he’s gotten those things that are like a four-pack for $5. You can guess at the quality of these movies. So a few nights ago, we watched one of his new purchases, a gem of a film entitled Raging Sharks. (I suppose it’s only fair to mention, spoiler alert.) We put the movie in, and the first thing that happens is that there are aliens who send a capsule thing down into the ocean. Are we really watching a movie called Raging Sharks? We then meet the crew working on a deep sea lab, led by a doctor and his wife. They found some weird red crystals that the resident scientist says are like nothing else on the planet. Oh yeah, and there are a bunch of killer sharks. Raging sharks, if you will. When they attack the lab, we see the exact same shot of a shark biting some kind of pipe THREE TIMES. Literally, the same shot. After each time, it cuts to the interior of the lab and some lights flicker. (The movie was also full of stock footage. We saw the same generic shots of sharks swimming around, a boat bobbing along the waves, and a submarine too many times to count.) There are also a couple more scenes of shark attacks, and then sharks are never seen again. The majority of the movie is not about sharks at all. There was a guy there who we were told was with some kind of agency, checking up on the lab and making sure everything was up to code or whatever. After that shark attack on the lab, they call a nearby submarine to come help them. The sub captain says they’ll be there in 35 minutes, but the doctor in the lab says they only have 20 minutes of oxygen left. They decide to go outside the lab to try to fix it, despite the raging sharks, but it somehow breaks more. Now they only have 10 minutes of oxygen, they say. Now we find out that the guy checking up on them is actually with the “black ops” and has been sent to kill them all because they are finding out about the red crystals, which the government wants to keep secret. He kills everyone in the lab but the doctor and his wife. How convenient. Half an hour after they said they only had 10 minutes of oxygen left, they manage to kill the black ops guy. After 40 minutes, they’re starting to get a little woozy. The wife falls unconscious. With fires burning all over the lab, sucking up the oxygen that was supposed to run out 30 minutes ago. The sub gets there and believes that everyone in the lab is dead so they sail away. Suddenly, the aliens appear again. The doctor sees them, but his wife is unconscious and the sub is already leaving. I honestly don’t know what the aliens did, but it was probably something with the crystals. Then we suddenly see the doctor and the wife on the submarine. I think we are supposed to assume that, supposedly oxygen deprived and with his unconscious wife in tow, the doctor swam fast enough to catch up with the sub. I feel like this description does not accurately show how horrible this movie was. We were all laughing hysterically most of the time.

This past weekend (I’m writing this on 6/20) was really fun. There’s apparently a really famous whitewater festival in Salida every summer called FIBArk, pronounced exactly how it looks. Through careful research (I read it on a T-shirt I saw), I found out that it stands for First in Boating the Arkansas. Apparently the Arkansas River is really good for whitewater activities, especially the part that goes through Salida. They have this festival every year with all kinds of rafting competitions, a fair, and live music. Both Friday and Saturday, we got there at about 4 or 5. We watched whatever competition that was happening then had dinner. Heather, Jess, Michala, and I all went to this one pub for dinner on Friday. It was SO delicious. Heather and I both had veggie sandwiches that came with cucumbers, lettuce, red onions, sprouts, cream cheese, and guacamole, all on some delicious toasted wheat bread. We also got to sit outside on the patio. We decided that we wanted to come back for dinner on Saturday, variety be darned. Saturday we were joined by Becky and also Jimmy from the BLM, with whom we managed to meet up. It was just as delicious as the first time. So both nights, we finished the awesome dinner right around the time the music started. Friday it was an electronic band called BoomBox, and Saturday it was a bluegrass band called Hot Buttered Rum. They were both pretty good. Why have I never discovered electronic concerts? They were so much fun to dance to. Most of us danced till the music was over. Friday night we just went home after the music, but Saturday some of us wanted to stay out. Heather, Jess, and I went to a bar with Jimmy and Will, one of the fire guys we ran into after the concert, while the others went home (Will gave us a ride home since he lives about three blocks from us). We got a little more dancing in there. It was a really fun weekend.

And now the blog is only a week away from the present! I'm so close!